This paper is part of a larger project which looks into
the African legacy in Mexican Spanish language and culture. It’s rooted in
an exhibit at the African Museum of Art in Philadelphia two years ago; this
exhibit brought to light issues that Afro-Mexicans had faced and might still
be facing in Mexico. Drawing on a sociolinguistic approach which loosely
encompasses perceptual dialectology and critical discourse analysis,
attitudes towards Afro-Mexicans will be analyzed as seen in three popular
movies from the late 1950s and a popular soap opera from the mid 1980s. The
following pages are dedicated to answer two questions: Are Mexicans
prejudiced against Afro-Mexicans? Have Mexicans’ attitudes towards
Afro-Mexicans changed?

Introduction

Mexico was a Spanish colony for three centuries; its name
was New Spain. Africans were brought to the Americas as slaves or as
descendants of slaves starting in the sixteenth century; an economic
motivation fueled this phenomenon. Men were put to work in “mine labor or
heavy field work such as sugar cane…while women did domestic labor or light
agricultural work…cotton cultivation” ( Zelisky 1949: 158; López Morales
1998). There are incomplete records of the number of Africans brought to the
New World and the dates of their arrival; however, it is estimated that more
than one and a half million African slaves were taken to Spanish America.
Veracruz, Mexico; Cartagena de Indias and Portobello, Colombia were some of
the most important ports of entry for African slaves among other Latin
American ports (Lipski1994). In Mexico, they worked in the mining towns
located in the highlands.

Several scholars have tracked down their presence and
influence in the country; however, few enclaves of Afro-Mexicans have been
found along the east and west coastlines: the Costa Chica [Guerrero and
Oaxaca] and Tabasco and Veracruz respectively (Aguirre Beltrán 1994; Vaughn
2005; Muhammad 1991). According to Muhammad (1991: 169), “the last census to
collect data by ethnic group was in 1810 when Afro-Mexicans represented
10.2%. A 1950 estimate revealed that Afro-Mexicans was about 5.1%”.
Currently, the National Census doesn’t account for Afro-Mexicans; none-of
the questions address this information. Unofficial estimation considers that
0.04% of the population is Afro-descendant. Research has been done mainly
from the cultural and anthropological perspectives: Hernández Cuevas (2003;
2004) analyses several Mexican cultural practices and finds their origin in
African roots, and Vaughn (2005) and Muhammad (1991) contend the existence
of a subtle discrimination against African descendants in the country.

This paper bridges between these approaches and the
sociolinguistic perspective from critical discourse analysis and perceptual
dialectology. Critical Discourse Analysis considers language use as a form
of social practice. Paraphrasing Fairclough and Wodak (1997: 258) when
describing discourse as a social practice, one establishes a relationship
between a particular event and the social structures that frame it. In this
relationship, the discursive event is shaped by the situation and social
practices, but the event shapes them too. Perceptual dialectology studies
the attitudes toward one’s own language and other linguistic varieties; this
is measured through language attitude which are people’s feelings towards
their own language or the language of others. Here, the term is adapted to
analyze attitudes towards Afro-Mexicans.

Since attitude is “an internal state of readiness, rather
than an observable response, we must report on the person’s reports of what
their attitudes are or infer indirectly from behavior patterns” (Fasold
1994: 147). A totally indirect method is used to measure non-African
descendant attitudes towards Afro-Mexicans: (1) looking at the story line
and setting of the films and soap opera; (2) Afro-descendants’ origin,
education and job; (3) Afro-Mexican characters’ opinions about themselves
and non-Afro-Mexicans’ opinions towards the first group; and (4) actresses
playing Afro-descendant and non-Afro-descendant characters. A brief synopsis
of the four items analyzed is necessary.

“Angelitos Negros” “Little Black Angels’ (henceforth LBA)
is a classic [1] movie that is played repetitively in the Mexican channels
and now in the cable Classic Mexican Cinema. LBA is about a famous Mexican
singer who falls in love with and marries a blonde woman, Ana Luisa, whose
mother, Mercé, is her deceased rich father’s maid. Ana Luisa doesn’t know
that her nanny is her mother and she is extremely prejudiced against blacks.
Ana Luisa bears a daughter who is born mulato; she blames her husband and
rejects her daughter. José Carlos Ruiz, her husband, accepts the blame to
protect Ana Luisa from having a nervous breakdown. Ana Luisa doesn’t show
any love for her daughter and makes her extremely unhappy. Mercé cares for
the granddaughter. Mercé in an attempt to stop Ana Luisa from running away
from home is pushed downstairs causing her death. At that point, Jose Carlos
shouts that Mercé is her mother. The movie ends with José Carlos and his
daughter accepting Ana Luisa’s repentance in the name of Mercé who dies
before forgiving her.

“Pintame Angelitos Blancos” ‘Paint Little White Angels
for me’, (henceforth PLWA) the second most popular movie [2], is about a
rich general who is married to a blonde younger woman who is unfaithful to
him. His son, who ran away after his father’s marriage, dies leaving a widow
and two children. Upon receiving a telegraph informing him of his son’s
decease, the general goes to the small town by the ocean to pick them up and
take them home with him. However, when he discovers that his son married a
black woman and has a white daughter and a black son, he refuses to take
them with him. Nevertheless, his daughter in-law convinces him to take his
granddaughter. The general and his granddaughter, Titina, hide the mother’s
and brother’s race to Ana Luisa, the wife. When Titina’s mother goes to see
her, she remains in the house as the cook with the condition of never
telling the general’s wife that she is his granddaughter’s mother. Because
Ana Luisa doesn’t believe her husband, the general forces María Dolores to
deny her daughter. Ana Luisa fires María Dolores who goes back to her
hometown. Later Ana Luisa runs away with her lover. After Ana Luisa leaves,
María Dolores shows up with her husband’s former boss, an Afro-Mexican,
demanding the general to tell Titina that she is her mother. The general
apologizes for his actions and affirms he will tell Titina the truth. The
movie ends with the grandfather, the mother and the grandchildren being
together in what seems to be a happy family ever after.

“Negro es mi color” ‘Black is my color’, (henceforth BIMC)
the least popular movie [3] of the group, is about a white woman, Luna, who
is the bastard daughter of a rich man and a poor black woman. Luna is
tricked into believing that she has wed a white sailor on board of his ship.
After being intimate with her, he jumps ship as soon as they dock. When the
captain informs Luna of the deception, she promises to take revenge on all
whites by making one of them fall in love with her. Later on, she becomes a
famous singer changing her name to Blanca del Rio. Blanca’s father is the
owner of the cabaret where she sings. There, she has two suitors: a pilot
and the cabaret’s administrator who is truly in love with her. Both men are
prejudiced against blacks. Blanca decides to have sex with the cabaret’s
administrator after he criticizes blacks. The following morning, she reveals
to him that she is black and has him fired from his job. Blanca’s father
invites her to go on a trip with him without knowing that she is his
daughter. Blanca’s mother goes to the city looking for her and finds her.
Ashamed of her mother, Blanca allows her to stay at her house as a maid
concealing her true relationship. The fired cabaret’s administrator reveals
her origin to the pilot who rejects Blanca. Then, she decides to go away
with her father without knowing who he is. Nevertheless, Blanca’s mother
recognizes him when he goes to pick her up and reveals to him that he has
pursued his own daughter. Upon finding this out, Blanca runs away. She is
pregnant and wants to end the pregnancy fearing that she might have a
mulatto child. After deciding to keep the child, she goes back home to find
her mother’s funeral. When she is crying, heartbroken, the cabaret’s former
administrator shows up; he has discovered that he is truly in love with her
and forgives her deception. The movie ends with a hopeful perspective for
the couple.

“El derecho de nacer” ‘The Right to be Born’ (henceforth
RTBB) is the remake of a Cuban radio soap opera. It is about a rich family’s
daughter María Elena who gets pregnant out of wedlock and her father asks a
black servant to kill the bastard grandson to hide his daughter’s sin. María
Dolores, the rich woman’s daughter’s black nanny saves the child and takes
him away from his grandfather because she promised Maria Elena to take care
of him. María Dolores raises the white child as her own giving him her last
name, but informing him that she is not his birth mother. Even though
Alberto knows that María Dolores isn’t his birth mother, he doesn’t tell it
to anybody; not even his fiancé who has prejudices against blacks which ends
their engagement. Later on, he falls in love with the adopted grandchild of
his grandparents. The truth is revealed to him and he forgives his
grandfather and father for everything they did against him. The end of the
soap opera is a happy family scene where Alberto and his girlfriend get
married and his grandparents, birth mother and adopted black mother are
proud of him.

Analysis

These films’ and soap opera’s plots agree with what
Monsiváis calls “melodramas”, the prevailing fifties storylines, “where good
and bad characters interact; where everybody suffers physical or emotional
pain regardless of their social status; where rich people apparently suffer
less than poor people; however, they are alone and destroyed” (1984: 36). In
this context, it is noteworthy to emphasize that Afro-descendants are always
illegitimate children who are only recognized by their rich fathers once
they are born white: Ana Luisa in LBA and Titina in PLWA. Ana Luisa’s
father, Agustín de la Fuente, gives her his name and fortune in LBA. In PLWA,
a white man, Jaime de la Barra, marries an African descendant woman after
she bears a white child, “The day she was born, we saw that she was so
beautiful that her father, with tears in his eyes, asked me to marry him.”
Jaime’s prejudice might be supported and strengthened by his widow’s comment
referring to her second born, “When Benito was born, Jaime’s eyes turned
sad”. In contrast, Luna’s father, Don Álvaro, disappears from her mother’s
life after he impregnated her. The fathers’ last names suggest these
characters’ Spaniard ancestry and wealth: “Don Agustín de la Fuente”; “Don
Jaime de la Barra” and “Don Álvaro”. The Afro-descendant women, conversely,
never hold a family name in any of the films; they are always addressed by
their first names which might suggest their lower position in their society:
“the ways members of one ethnic group speak among each other are of course
related to their position in society, and how they are spoken to and spoken
about by the dominant group members” (Van Dijk et al. 1997: 145). Not only
doesMaría Dolores in the 1982 soap opera
hold a family name, but also other characters question the fact that nobody
seems ever to have asked her last name. These two facts might suggest an
attitude change in the population. However, she is not Alberto’s birth
mother, but his adoptive one.

Three stories considered here have the coastline as the
setting: PLBA, BIMC and RTBB. Setting refers to the physical environment
where the story takes place. The coastline has been documented as the port
of entry to Africans and their main settlement site. In the soap opera, RTBB,
the port of Veracruz is clearly identified. Even though LBA takes place in
Mexico City, whenever there is a musical performance where Afro-descendants
appear, palm trees and tropical scenery surrounds the performers.

About Afro-descendants’ education received and job
performed, there seems to be a clear distinction between the color of the
skin and the characters’ education and occupation: the Afro-descendants,
Mercé in LBA; Luna’s mother in BIMC; María Dolores in PLWA and in RTBB hold
meager jobs; they are maids. In fact, an Afro-descendant man, Bruno in the
soap opera is the man given the task of killing his boss’s illegitimate
grandchild. He even states that, “he is in charge of doing his boss’s filthy
jobs.” The occupations displayed by Afro-Mexicans agree with Muhammad (1991:
176) who states that “their primary sources of income are fishing, farming
and domestic work”.

The mulatto children have slightly different occupations:
Ana Luisa is a school principal (LBA); Blanca del Río is a singer at night
clubs(BIMC); Titina is a ten year old who sings and dances to entertain hergrandfather and neighbors; her brother, Benito is the comic relief in
the whole movie (PLWA); and Alberto Limonta (RTBB) is a physician. In LBA,
two other Afro-Mexicans are musicians and dancers who appear on stage with
the main character. Entertainment seems to be mulatto children’s and the
supporting actors’ main activity. This agrees with Jackson who, quoting
Lemuel Johnson, finds that “dating back to Spain Golden Age [drama] and
before…has made the Black a literary toy, an orphic buffoon, a bongo-beating
idiot mindlessly singing and dancing his way down through the centuries”
(Jackson 1975: 470). The roles assigned to these characters also strengthen
their image given in the early days of filmmaking which is “stooges,
retainers (maids, butlers), brutes, dancers, thieves, child-like” (Snead,
1994: 139).

Notwithstanding, in spite of the fact that Titina in PLWA
has an entertainment role dancing and singing, she also questions the
treatment given to her sibling and mother due to their skin color. This is
reiterated by Alberto Limonta’s character in RTBB; his questioning is
strengthened by the fact that he is an adult. These comments take us to the
Afro-descendants characters’ statements about themselves. All Afro-Mexicans
make self-deprecating comments about themselves: Mercé calls herself black
and ugly; as if one were a natural consequence of the other; Titina’s mother
asks her daughter not to tell anybody that she is black because she is ugly;
María Dolores in RTBB affirms that she is dark skinned therefore ugly. This
agrees with Vaugh’s findings, “Afro-Mexicans commonly lament that their skin
color and facial features make them ugly. The words feo [ugly] and negro
seem to be synonymous in many instances” (2005: 52).

Most of the African descendant children also make
negative and offensive comments towards their skin color: Blanca del Río in
BIMC rejects her ancestry; Ana Luisa is ashamed of having a mulatto daughter
and denies her when a blonde friend visits. She adds that she would rather
be dead than having an Afro-Mexican mother. In contrast, Titina and Alberto
aren’t ashamed of their mother’s skin color. Other characters in BIMC make
discriminatory comments towards Afro-Mexicans or look at them as something
exotic. Considering this attitude, and the fact that the ten year old-Titina
criticizes the differential treatment that Afro-descendants suffer, might
indicate a change of attitude towards this group starting in the
mid-fifties. This idea is strengthened by the sharp criticism that the young
adult, Alberto in RTBB voices against people who give a differential
treatment to others due to their skin color. He emphasizes that people are
worthy because of their moral values and not because of the color of their
skin or their wealth. These statements bring the issue to light which starts
the conversation on discrimination against Afro-Mexicans and might suggest a
possible social change in attitude.

Regarding the actors and actresses in the films and the
soap opera, it should be that pointed out the Afro-Mexican mother is played
by the same actress, Rita Montaner; she was a Cuban actress who had heavy
black makeup to make her look darker. The same blonde actress, Emilia Guiú
plays Ana Luisa in LBA and in PLWA. This might point to the Cinema Studios’
working contract or the lack of blondes and Afro-descendant actors in Mexico
during the years of movie production.

The answer to the two questions posed at the beginning of
these pages is not black or white, but it might be positive with a caveat.
Indeed, the films’ storylines, settings, Afro-Mexicans’ occupations and
education suggest strong discrimination against Afro-descendants. However,
there seems to be a clear evolution in the characters’ attitudes from
mid-fifties and early sixties to early eighties: even though
Afro-descendants are rejected and discriminated against in the film PLWA and
the soap opera (RTBB), two main characters voiced their rejection towards
any discrimination against Afro-Mexicans. Titina indicates to her
grandfather that it isn’t Afro-descendants’ fault to have a dark skin color.
She also narrates a fable which depicts Afro-descendants as the mixture of
the best of all races. This fable might be interpreted as a modified version
of José Vasconcelos’s Cosmic Race La Raza Cósmica [4] which proclaims Latin
Americans as the mixture of the best of the races in the continents:
African, Amerindian, Asian and Spaniard.

It is also important to consider what Monsiváis (36)
writes about how the melodrama works in Mexican society: “it is a general
explication of reality which is accepted by the public because it doesn’t
have any other alternative…There isn’t labor exploitation, there is bad
luck; there isn’t pillage, there is pain in this world…” Since the media are
shaped by society and also play a role in the diffusion of social and
cultural changes; “Media texts constitute a sensitive barometer of
sociocultural change, and they should be seen as valuable material for
researching change” (Fairclough 1995: 51-52). Thus, it might be possible to
infer a process of change towards Afro-Mexicans as shown in the films and
soap opera discussed here.

The conversation on discrimination against
Afro-Mexicans, that seems to take place in the films and soap opera
considered here, has transcended the celluloid characters and has been
projected on the screen of society; the fact that the most popular movie,
LBA, continued to be broadcasted and the lack of modern films addressing
this topic suggest that this issue is still current in modern Mexico.
Conversely, the INAH (Mexican Institute of Anthropology and History)
recorded “corridos” and “sones” which are popular Afro-Mestizo’s songs [5]
in La Costa Chica in the Pacific Coast, and in the Atlantic Coast of Mexico
in 1967 as part of a project [6] to rescue Afro-descendants’ traditions (Muratalla,
2000). Moreover, the topic on Afro-Mexico has attracted scholars’ interest
within and outside the country since the last decade; Mexicans are generally
blamed for denying their Afro-Mexican roots and having prejudices against
this group. More recently, a controversy between the United States and
Mexico in 2005 sprang from the release of a postage stamp which featured a
popular cartoon character from the 1940s igniting the discussion on
Mexicans’ prejudice against Afro-descendants [7]. It is noteworthy to point
out what was indicated earlier about the current National Mexican Census
which does not account for Afro-descendants; whilst this is true, none of
the questions addresses anybody’s ancestry, except for a question dealing
with speaking an indigenous language. The inclusion of this question is
quite recent in the census. Consequently, there is still a long way to go
before everybody is accounted for in Mexico.

The conversation on
discrimination against Afro-Mexicans should continue, however, labeling each
other as the “other” should be avoided: “Discourses of Otherness are
articulated by both dominant majorities and subordinate minorities. Others
are not just groups that are devalued, marginalized, or silenced by dominant
majorities (Riggins, 1997: 6)”. Diversity and multiculturalism should be
embraced within and outside Mexico; one should recognize and praise
Afro-Mexican cultural contribution to modern Mexico and any discrimination
should be eradicated; currently it seems that the conversation has been
steered into the right direction.

[1] This assertion is
based on the fact that the movies chosen here form part of the
African Influence Exhibit in Mexico and Hernández Cuevas (2000)
quoting Maximiliano Maza who affirms that this movie belongs to the
Mexican Cinema Golden Epoch period. It was made in 1948.

[3] This film was made
in 1951. It is rarely broadcasted; not many people know it and it is
extremely difficult to purchase a copy.

[4] Vasconcelos exalts
Latin American men’s origin as the mixture of all the races. Several
scholars have criticized this perspective on the Latin American as a
way to conceal the African presence in the region.

[6] Muratalla indicates
this in his introduction to the recorded “corridos”.

[7] The postage stamp
portrays a very popular cartoon created in the forties as part of
the series honoring the most popular cartoonists in Mexico by
Mexican Postal Service. It will not be discussed here the merits of
the controversy; this illustrates the Afro-Mexicans’ importance in
contemporary Mexico.